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Our understanding of cancer has evolved significantly over the past decade. Research indicates that diet and lifestyle play a much larger role in the development of cancer than previously thought. Leading health and medical experts have begun to focus more and more on prevention, with increasing focus on plant-based diets. To help prevent cancer, the American Cancer Society recommends maintaining a healthy weight throughout life, staying physically active on a regular basis, and adopting a healthy plant-based diet.1

Summer is officially here, and that means one thing: vacation! Whether you’re in school, or you’ve graduated to the daily grind, summer is still synonymous with relaxing, having fun and enjoying time with family and friends. Though you might have grown up equating summer time with junk food, if you really want to stay active, have fun and feel good, don’t take a vacation from eating healthy.

Making healthy food accessible and affordable for everyone has been a focus of Down to Earth since opening its first store at Wailuku on Maui 35 years ago. The idea was that whole, minimally processed foods often cost less than highly processed foods -- those laden with fat, sugar, additives and preservatives--because the cost to produce, package, and market them is much less.

Back in 1977, when Down to Earth was founded by a group of friends in Wailuku, Maui, “health food” was considered unconventional. The idea of improving your health through organic and natural foods and a vegetarian lifestyle was a passion for some, but it was not a concept many people thought about at the time.

As we approach Earth Day this upcoming April 22nd, I am reminded of the environmental benefits of a plant-based diet. Advocates of a plant-based diet have long been aware that what we choose to eat is one of the most significant factors in the personal impact we have on the environment.1 Switching from a meat-based diet to a diet based on whole grains, fruits and vegetables reduces water and land use, lowers pollution, slows deforestation and reduces destruction of topsoil, among other benefits.2 Now, government organizations are beginning to catch on

In February, we highlighted Meatless Mondays… now in March it's Meatout Month! Spring is the perfect time to make resolutions to eat healthier and make changes to your lifestyle for the better. Meatout is a grassroots campaign organized by a nonprofit group that promotes animal rights. Every year on or around March 20th, the Meatout Campaign coordinates or inspires others to coordinate events around the world that help introduce people to a wholesome, compassionate, plant-based diet.

Thanks to the Meatless Monday campaign, the benefits of a plant-based diet are getting more exposure than ever before! Meatless Monday is an initiative by the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health to encourage people to cut meat out of their diet one day a week. They chose Mondays because studies have found that resolutions made on the first day of the week are more likely to stick. Mondays give people a fresh start and a chance to make healthy changes to their routine.

“Learn and Live.”

That’s the motto of the American Heart Association (AHA), which might strike you as innocuous at first, until you consider the alternative. Most of us are used to the age-old saying “Live and learn,” but when you’re providing care to people with preventable chronic disease, you realize very quickly that we don’t have that luxury indefinitely.

Every Christmas we're challenged to pick gifts for friends and loved ones. We wrack our brains for the right items, with the right brand names. Sometimes we consider our finances and decide where to sacrifice and where to splurge. “What can I give that really expresses my love and care?”

Long before the Pilgrims, native Hawaiians celebrated "Makahiki," the longest thanksgiving in the world, which lasted four months—approximately November through February. During this time, both work and war were forbidden.1, 2 As the most important holiday of the year, Makahiki is the traditional Hawaiian celebration of the harvest and time of personal rest and spiritual and cultural renewal.3 It was a humbling experience.